Archive | Zach Blas

life pulses

2004

A camera is pointed at a blank analog video monitor and detects the cathrode-ray scanning process, an act typically not perceivable during television spectatorship. Similar to medical equipment that reveals biometric information on bodies, such as heart rate or temperature, the camera exposes the “life pulses” of the monitor.

photocopies

2004

Nine photographs of mannequin parts are photocopied, beginning with an original and continuing by photocopying a copy of a copy of a copy. Each photograph is copied nine times, resulting in 81 photocopies. As the image is continuously photocopied, it reaches a tone stability; some body parts disappear quickly into black while others remain in abstract globs of white. photocopies asks where is the body in the image when technological mediation appears to have disappeared the figure. Why do some body parts remain visible, while others are erased?

photocopies, installation detail (2004)

Hole(s) of Non-Teleology

2006

Hole(s) of Non-Teleology is an interactive video installation that examines video feedback and the queer act of anal fisting. Live video feedback is set up in a space and projected onto a wall. Based on the number of participants listening with the installed headphones, the video feedback projection becomes interrupted with video of anal fisting and audio feedback. The piece oscillates from a technological abstraction of queer sexuality to a “group sex act” between installation and participants. Hole(s) of Non-Teleology poses the possibilities of a queer technology, suggesting that a formal and technical relation exists between video feedback and anal fisting.

Hole(s) of Non-Teleology, installation detail (2006)

tv pillow

2004

Video static is projected onto a pillow. Where a head would rest, there is now scrambled, empty signals of information transmission. tv pillow awaits the head that will sleep on it, filling its frenetic signals with thoughts and dreams.

tv pillow (2004)

the operation

2004

A mannequin is split in two and surrounded by a series of probing cameras and television monitors. The mannequin, itself an abstraction of the human body, is undergoing a medial operation or examination. While the mannequin is typically thought of as a rendition of the outer surface of the human, the operation records, or extracts, the “insides” of the mannequin and presents this on a series of monitors, giving the mannequin’s newfound depth a new surface, which is the video monitor.

the operation, installation (2004)

the operation, installation detail (2004)